Ice Cream Wasted

Everyone’s Favorite Frozen Treat Gets a Little Tipsy

You can’t freeze alcohol. That’s what everyone told Brigid Calloway when she started out, but Brigid only took that as a challenge: “Right, watch me.” Years later, she found a way to freeze alcohol and started Ice Cream Wasted, selling her own unique ice cream shots. In early 2015, Brigid opened her business in Houston and relocated it to Plano when she moved this past January.

Brigid was in college, studying to become a chemist, when the idea came to her. Walking down the aisles in Wal-Mart one day, she wondered why no one had ever combined liquor and ice cream. At the time, she didn’t act on the idea.

After graduating and working in a job she didn’t want, she decided to pursue her college dream of creating alcohol infused ice cream. “Let me try this,” she decided, and began studying everything from crystallization to salt to Blue Bell. She took every ice cream imaginable and lined it up in her freezer, figuring out what she needed to do to freeze alcohol.

“And then I figured it out, but if I told you that, I’d have to kill you,” Brigid says, laughing.

She fell in love with the freedom to be creative. “I can literally create whatever I want to,” she says, and she does. Brigid started cooking when she was eight, and she never stopped. Her ice cream is dairy-free and made with coconut milk. Non-alcoholic options are also available.

She brought her creations to events in Houston and worked many catering gigs, gaining more recognition and responses. “It spread like fire and I never looked back,” Brigid says.

From the beginning, Brigid had no intention of opening an ice cream scoop shop. To be in the shop from sun up to sun down was not what she had in mind. Manufacturing and distribution have always been her dream. Now, she’s poised to distribute at HEB/Central Market stores. At the Ice Cream Wasted website, there is the option of signing up for in-store tastings or placing an order of any size.

What sets Brigid’s ice cream apart isn’t just the alcohol, though that’s certainly appealing. It’s the flavors she tries that are so unexpected. She looks at something ordinary and adds her own touch, transforming it. Brigid spends time on colors and aesthetics of the ice cream, and every shot is so exquisitely presented. She’s not afraid to create something completely unconventional, like the 24K Golden Milk Sugar Rush that is curry and turmeric-infused.

“I’m just enjoying the process for once,” Brigid says. Her process is fun and simple; she thinks of a dessert she’d want to eat and makes it. Right now, she’s thinking about making a pizza-flavored ice cream shot. Brigid also brings ingredients and flavors from different cultures and holidays.